The second-wave Klan could return to its roots of terror because it had survived the kind of scrutiny that would have killed off any other secret society in a democracy. A three-week exposé by the New York World in the fall of 1921 had detailed murder, flogging, iron-branding, arson—at least one hundred acts of vigilante violence nationwide. The revelations, many people thought, would horrify most Americans. The series was widely syndicated and prompted a congressional investigation. With cameras clicking and a mass of reporters in attendance, Imperial Wizard Simmons told another story in
...more
